Trying to get more practice on networks, why everyone going straight to security/penetration testing related books when there are other subjects that would introduce great deals for pentesters, I'm thinking about buying this book, any one read it? its more a practical book includes steps for setting your own network lab, also provides exercises.

The book seems a little short which makes me doubt that it covers the topics in requisite detail. TCP/IP Illustrated covers less and is three times as long. I'd recommend reading the Cisco CCNA books by Odom and then TCP/IP illustrated Vol I or Douglas Comer's Internetworking with TCP/IP.

unicityd wrote:The book seems a little short which makes me doubt that it covers the topics in requisite detail. TCP/IP Illustrated covers less and is three times as long. I'd recommend reading the Cisco CCNA books by Odom and then TCP/IP illustrated Vol I or Douglas Comer's Internetworking with TCP/IP.

I've gone through some topics of CCNA book + TCP/IP Illustrated, they mainly focus on theory while this book focus on how to set up a network lab and experiment on it, that is why it brought my attention.

Be careful how you judge the material. Almost all books that deal with networking in some fashion start off with the theory items. Also in a lab situation you may never truly touch on some important topics in networking. It isn't a bad idea to go with CCNA material. Cisco equipment is the most widely used networking platform. So if anything you learn a enough to go and get a CCNA, which makes an excellent intro level cert to get you in the door. As for TCP/IP illustrated, definitely a bible to have.

TCP/IP Illustrated isn't a theory book: it follows sniffs of real traffic throughout. If the other book helps you, great. But, you can just setup a few machines and start playing around. Setup servers for FTP, HTTP, Telnet, SSH and sniff the traffic. Monitor your ordinary web/email traffic. Setup a Snort box and monitor traffic with that. If you have access to Cisco equipment, you can put that into the mix; otherwise, download one of the network sims and practice Cisco commands on that.